State of the Franchise: The Rams Before Free Agency

The Rams are coming off of a somewhat disappointing 7-9 season, but have showed a lot of promised along the way. Considering St. Louis was the youngest team in the league and dismantled teams like Indianapolis, Chicago, and New Orleans along the way; Rams fans have reason to hope. Unfortunately, this season has split Rams nation into two parties; Bradford-believers and Bradford-haters. This looks like the season where Bradford is going to have to show if he’s an NFL starter or just another number one overall bust. Not only is the quarterback position a controversy but if the team is going to even stay in St. Louis seems to be up in the air. Because of all the uncertainty and speculation we won’t even discuss if the Rams are destined to move to LA.

Not only are the Rams the youngest team in the NFL, but it looks like they are trying to get a lot younger too. With a laundry list of unrestricted free agents from big contributors like Roger Staffold, JoLonn Dunbar, and Kellen Clemens to less used players like Chris Williams, Mike McNeill, and Justin Veltung; it does not look like the Rams are currently trying to keep any of these free agents on the roster now that Staffold announced that he is not coming back for the 2014-2015 season. This leaves the Rams in the most classic offseason predicament, address needs in the draft or through free agency?

Anybody who remotely follows the Rams knows by now that St. Louis has been in contact with free safety Jarius Byrd and cornerback Alterraun Verner. Byrd could quite possibly be the best safety in the NFL and Verner’s numbers are right up there with the best corners in the league. The big question is if the Rams are willing to make Byrd one of the highest paid players at his position and if the Rams want to dish out big time money for Verner who has only played at an elite level for one year. Should the Rams dish out big time money for these high caliber free agents or should they pocket the cap space and look to retain big time talent in the future (Robert Quinn)?

Oh yeah, and who can forget the number two overall pick in the 2014 NFL draft? Les Snead is looking more and more like a draft genius every day with the way he maneuvered the RG3 trade and the high level of play from his draft picks. Even though Snead has done a great job the Rams cannot focus on the past, another great draft is going to have to be in the cards if this team wants to be successful. How is Snead going to show his draft genius this year? Is he going to trade down the number two pick? Will he draft a player like Jadeveon Clowney even though defensive end is not a need? Only time will tell but let’s all hope Snead continues his great drafting ways.

Who will St. Louis target in free agency? Who will the Rams draft? Is Sam Bradford the answer? Is this the year this team finally gets over the hump? There are a lot of questions surrounding this team, but these questions will start to be answered once free agency opens on Tuesday, March 11th, at 4:00 PM

We are a group of volunteers and starting a new scheme in our community.
Your website provided us with valuable info to work on. You have done an impressive job and our whole community will be thankful
to you.